Getty Images / Maggie Vaughn - Shepherd Express
Thursday, March 5
Blackberry Smoke w/ The Temperance Movement and Leon Virgil Bowers @ The Rave, 8 p.m.
The members of the Southern rock act Blackberry Smoke are used to being on the road. They spent years touring throughout the United States as a supporting act for artists such as Zac Brown Band, ZZ Top and Lynyrd Skynyrd, before proving themselves as big-time headlines in their own right with their 2012 album The Whippoorwill, a set of powerful, haunting blues rock accompanied by soaring pipe organ. The group’s latest record, Holding All The Roses, scales back some of the jamming that marked their previous releases in favor of tighter country-rock songs that should please their ever-widening fanbase.
The Musical Box @ The Pabst Theater, 8 p.m.
Cover bands don’t get any more meticulously researched than the French-Canadian Genesis tribute act The Musical Box, which doesn’t just cover Genesis songs, but rather recreates entire Genesis tours, right down to the elaborate costumes and set designs. For their latest round on the road, The Musical Box is restaging the band’s tour behind their 1972 album Foxtrot. The album found the band delving deeper into experimental prog rock and stretching out their songs to new lengths—its second side is dominated by a 22-minute song—and the band’s tour reflected their growing artistic ambitions.
Friday, March 6
Young Thug and Travis Scott w/ Metro Boomin @ The Rave, 8 p.m.
Like Lil Wayne nearly a decade ago, Young Thug has pushed the boundaries of acceptable expression in commercial hip-hop, rapping in a wild, lunatic sputter that seems to invent its own rules as it goes along. It’s no wonder, then, why Lil Wayne’s mentor Birdman took such a shine to the young Atlanta rapper, taking him under his wing and giving him the star treatment on last year’s Rich Gang: The Tour Pt. 1 mixtape. Despite ongoing label confusion that could prevent him from releasing a commercial album anytime soon, Thug was everywhere in 2014, splattered over dozens of mixtapes and featured in hourly rotation on rap radio with the singles “Lifestyle” and “About the Money.” He shares this show with Travis Scott, a rapper/producer affiliated with Kanye West’s GOOD Music circle, and Metro Boomin, the Atlanta producer who has crafted some of Thug’s finest tracks.
|
|
Platinum Boys w/ Soup Moat, Rupert Angeleyes and Sat. Nite Duets @ Hotel Foster, 9 p.m.
Milwaukee’s Platinum Boys aren’t the first band to play riff-heavy rock ’n’ roll about getting wasted, but damn if they aren’t doing it better than just about anybody else right now. This month the group is releasing its debut full-length, Future Hits, nine tracks of lovably debauched songs about cheap highs, empty sex and, occasionally, the hunt for true love. They’re not the only band on this bill celebrating a new release. One of the city’s most distinctive punk bands, Soup Moat will release their collection of two-minute psychedelic punk experiments, the Enjoy Your Hobbies EP.
The Bang Bang w/ Mortgage Freeman, Ryan Holman and Brian Hibbard @ Linneman’s Riverwest Inn, 9 p.m.
Let’s face it: Blues-rock has an image problem. For years musicians outside the scene have viewed it as stale territory, the domain of stodgy old musicians with closed minds. But in recent years a new generation of young Milwaukee bands have begun putting their own spin on the genre, including The Bang Bang, whose brassy lead singer Katie Rash brings a whole lot of punk energy and soulful showmanship to the table. They make as fine a case for putting those old Blues Hammer stereotypes to rest as anyone. For this eclectic bill, they’re joined by Mortgage Freeman—a Milwaukee band with their own wild spin on blues, prog and classic rock—as well as comedian Ryan Holman and artist Brian Hibbard, who will be creating art live on site.
Saturday, March 7
Carly Aquilino @ Turner Hall Ballroom, 8 p.m.
Instantly recognizable with her fire-red hair and brassy New York accent, Carly Aquilino has starred for three seasons on MTV’s comedy compendium “Girl Code,” where she tackles many of the same subjects as her stand-up performances do: dating, sex and sisterhood. Her unflinching candor and her gleeful willingness to share even the most embarrassing details of her romantic life have made her one of the show’s breakout stars.
Sunday, March 8
Taking Back Sunday w/ Letlive and The Menzingers @ The Rave, 7 p.m.
Emo rockers Taking Back Sunday hit the ground running, earning a fast following with their charged 2002 full-length debut, Tell All Your Friends. That response wasn’t enough to keep the feuding band members together, though: A year later, bassist Shaun Cooper and guitarist John Nolan left on bitter terms, and though the band carried on without them, most diehard fans agreed that they lost some of their edge. To the surprise of fans who had assumed that a reunion of the Tell All Your Friends-era lineup was all but impossible, Cooper and Nolan rejoined the group in 2010. Even more surprising: That reunion has resulted in two solid new albums, 2011’s Taking Back Sunday and last year’s Happiness Is, both of which recapture some of the band’s early bite.
Travis Tritt @ Potawatomi Hotel & Casino, 7 p.m.
Like many of the biggest country stars of the ’90s, Travis Tritt flaunted a larger-than-life personality, bringing a sense of rock-star recklessness and outlaw danger to his rowdy country-rock. Country radio was sometimes reluctant to embrace him because of that rock influence, but he amassed big hits nonetheless, including “Can I Trust You with My Heart,” “Help Me Hold Out” and “Foolish Pride.” Recent years have found Tritt in label limbo. His 2007 album The Storm was hampered by a botched release on the struggling independent label Category 5 Records. After a long legal battle he re-released it on his own in 2013 with the cheeky new title The Calm After…
Wednesday, March 11
Bo Burnham @ The Pabst Theater, 8 p.m.
Internet goofball Bo Burnham was one of the early breakout stars of YouTube, where videos of the then-teenager singing about white supremacists and Helen Keller spread quickly. Never one to miss a chance to capitalize on adolescent-male humor, Comedy Central took the comic singer-songwriter under its wing, making him the youngest performer ever to headline “Comedy Central Presents.” Much of his comedy spoofs online culture, which was also the target of his one-season MTV comedy “Zach Stone is Gonna Be Famous.” That show cast Burnham as the title character, an 18-year-old on the lookout for cheap shortcuts that could make him a celebrity.
La Santa Cecilia @ Shank Hall, 8 p.m.
Members of Los Angeles’s Latin fusion party band La Santa Cecilia stem from all different backgrounds. Some were born in America, others were brought to the U.S. as children, and all of them were raised on a wide variety of music. As a result, their sound is a proud hodgepodge, drawing not just from Latin genres like cumbia, rhumba and bolero but also American styles of rock, pop, R&B and soul. The band’s forward-looking 2013 major label debut Treinta Días proved to be their breakthrough, netting them a Grammy Award the following year for Best Latin Rock, Urban or Alternative Album. They followed it up with 2014’s Someday New, a looser, more danceable album that compiled covers and originals.
